


Soulmates (Or Not)

by silentdescant



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Discussion of Soulmates, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-09 11:40:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20852834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silentdescant/pseuds/silentdescant
Summary: Four times Dan says he doesn't believe in soulmates + One time he kind of does





	Soulmates (Or Not)

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to Stefania for the feedback and cheerleading on this one. I wrote it about a month and a half ago and finally got the courage to post it! Please enjoy the fluff.

1.

“I think we’re soulmates, Dan,” Phil says one day from the opposite end of the couch. They’re watching a romantic comedy, so his statement isn’t totally out of the blue, but Dan still scoffs.

“Souls aren’t a real thing,” he says. “Soulmates is just a romantic trope for movies and books and whatever.”

“You don’t believe we’re meant to be together?” Phil asks. There’s an innocence to his tone that tells Dan he’s teasing, arguing just for the sake of winding Dan up.

Dan is helpless to resist the bait. He rolls his eyes. “No, Phil, nothing is _meant_ to happen. There’s no destiny or fate or whatever. We got lucky.”

“Do you believe in luck, then?”

“I believe in random coincidence.”

“But not soulmates.”

“No, Phil,” Dan replies. He can feel himself getting worked up, settling into the rhythm of their playful arguments. Phil knows exactly how to set him off. “The whole concept of souls and all the crap they can sense or feel or whatever is just ridiculous. It doesn’t matter, anyway. I don’t need a soul to know I love you. That’s something _we_ get to experience. It’s not up to some divine, predestined plan.”

“What if you never started watching YouTube, though? What if you never commented on my videos or on my twitter? We’d never have found each other.”

“Then we’d be different people!” Dan protests. “The circumstances in my life built up to me following you, just like your circumstances built up to you making videos and, I don’t know, thinking I was funny enough to reply to me.”

“I mostly just thought you were cute,” Phil teases.

“Whatever,” Dan says, blushing. “Our souls aren’t meant for each other. It’s not possible. We’re just humans. We’re just two people who crossed paths and chose to do something about it. We _chose_ to be together and love each other.”

Phil can’t hide his grin now. He’s pinching his lips together, trying to contain it, but the amusement is there, clear on his face. He reaches across the sofa cushion between them and pats Dan’s knee. “Aw, Dan, that’s very sweet.”

“I can be sweet if I want to,” Dan grumbles.

“I think I’m your soulmate,” Phil replies. He’s not bantering now, just playfully smug. The bastard.

“Soulmates aren’t a thing,” Dan insists. “I don’t have a soul, much less a soulmate.” But then, because Phil liked it so much when he said it before, he adds, “It doesn’t matter, anyway. I know I love you.”

Phil squeezes Dan’s knee. “You’re mine, then, at least.”

Dan lets it go. Because it does make him feel warm and settled, deep inside his chest where he imagines a soul might be, to hear that Phil is so sure.

2.

They’ve just turned the lights out, snuggling under the blankets in a pristine hotel room where everything feels too cold and too blank. Dan doesn’t really get homesick, but he doesn’t feel quite comfortable here until Phil wraps his arm around Dan’s chest and nuzzles against his shoulder.

“I’m glad you’re with me,” Dan whispers into the darkness. He’s not expecting a reply; Phil is pretty jetlagged.

“Mmm,” Phil sighs. “Yeah.” He’s mostly asleep, Dan thinks, his breath puffing rhythmically across Dan’s bare skin.

But then Phil says, “I like being with my soulmate.”

Dan’s brow creases. “What?”

“Mmm,” Phil sighs again. “Y’mine.”

Dan turns on his side to face him. They’re sharing a pillow; their noses are almost touching. Phil’s mouth is lax, his lips barely parted, and his eyes are gently closed. It makes Dan feel warm inside to see him so peaceful in sleep. 

“Soulmates aren’t real, Phil,” Dan whispers, remembering how Phil was winding him up a few weeks ago. “But it doesn’t matter, because I love you.”

He kisses the tip of Phil’s nose and Phil doesn’t react at all, decidedly in dreamland now, but Dan drifts off to sleep with a smile on his face.

3.

“Have you ever read those fanfics where people have birthmarks or tattoos to match their soulmates?” Phil asks without looking up from his laptop.

“Yeah.”

“Like where the first words they say to each other are written on their arm or something?”

“Yeah, I’ve read stuff like that.”

“We talked a lot online before we ever met in real life, so do you think for us it would be the first comment you left on one of my videos? Or maybe the first time we talked on twitter? Or do you think it has to be said out loud, like maybe the first time we went on Skype with each other? Or do you think—”

“It’s not _real_, Phil, it’s just fiction, so it could be anything they want,” Dan sighs.

“Yeah, but if we had tattoos like that, what—”

“Probably the first time we met IRL. Do you remember what we said to each other at the train station?”

Phil laughs a little. “I’m pretty sure you said ‘I can’t believe you’re real’ and I think I said ‘Oh my God, you’re so much taller than I thought you’d be.’”

“Great,” Dan says, rolling his eyes. “I’d love to have that slapped on my arm for the world to see.”

“I said taller but I meant prettier.”

“We’d already seen each other on Skype and in photos, you dork.”

“Yeah, but you’re even prettier in real life.” Phil scoots closer on the couch and nuzzles against Dan’s cheek.

“Stop flirting and go back to reading cheesy soulmate fanfic. Is this fic you’re reading about us?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t they know by now that I don’t have a soul?”

“You do. Deep down. Buried somewhere in there,” Phil says, poking Dan’s chest.

“Soulmates aren’t real, Phil,” Dan groans. “Besides, it doesn’t matter. I love you anyway.”

“I still think you’re my soulmate, Dan,” Phil insists.

After another few moments of snuggling, Phil retreats back to his corner of the couch and pulls his computer back onto his lap. “If our tattoos weren’t the first words we ever spoke to each other, if it was just, like, a catchphrase or something, I know what they would be.”

Dan waits for him to continue, then sighs and prompts him when he doesn’t. “And what is that?”

“Mine would say,” and Phil adopts a high pitched, whiny Dan-voice, “’It doesn’t matter, soulmates aren’t even real’, and yours would say ‘I don’t care, you’re mine.’”

Dan snorts with barely suppressed laughter. “We would be so disillusioned with the concept of soulmates if we grew up with that shit on our arms. We don’t need marks to know we love each other, Phil.”

“Nah,” Phil agrees, “but it’s a cute idea, I think.”

4.

“Give each other Sharpie tattoos,” Phil reads in an overly dramatic voice. He turns from the camera to Dan and asks, “What would you get tattooed, Daniel?”

“You can’t ask me that,” Dan squawks. “You know how I am about commitment. This is too big of a decision, you can’t make me choose right now. Why do you think I don’t have any tattoos already?”

“Fine, if you can’t decide, I’ll have to decide for you.” He brandishes the Sharpie like a weapon.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, why don’t you go first, if you’re so sure of yourself.” He swipes the pen out of Phil’s hand and uncaps it. “What would you get tattooed, then, Phil?”

Phil grins at him, his eyes sparkling with mischief. “The phrase ‘it doesn’t matter,’ on my arm where I can see it all the time.”

Dan’s heart stutters in his chest but he recovers quickly and asks, perhaps a bit softer than he meant to, “Why would you want that on your arm?”

It’s been three days since their conversation about soulmate tattoo fanfic and it’s obvious Phil doesn’t have an acceptable answer prepared, because he fumbles for a moment before speaking, and when he does speak it’s kind of a mess. They’ll have to cut that out of the video, maybe. “Just as a reminder, you know, like for, like when I’m out and I’m like, talking to people—It’s a reminder to not take things so seriously, whatever it is doesn’t matter that much, and it’s not worth getting anxious over.”

Dan shrugs. “Valid coping mechanism.” A believable lie, too.

He takes Phil’s wrist and pulls it over to rest on his own knee, the smooth, pale underside of his forearm upturned for Dan to carefully write the words on his skin.

They can’t write Phil’s usual response on Dan’s arm, not without digging themselves into a major hole with their audience, but after they finish filming, Phil leans close and tugs down the collar of Dan’s shirt.

He writes ‘you’re mine’ along Dan’s collarbone, tongue poking out in concentration, and seals it with a kiss.

“Why not on my arm where I can see it?” Dan asks quietly.

“Maybe I wanted the reminder more for me than for you. You’re my soulmate whether you believe in it or not.”

Dan rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling when he calls Phil an idiot and kisses his bitten-red lips.

“Do you really need a reminder that I love you?” Dan asks then, before they can get distracted. His voice comes out much quieter than he intended and he clears his throat nervously. “You know that I do, right? Even if I don’t believe in soulmates?”

“Of course, Dan,” Phil murmurs. “You don’t have to believe in it. I get why you don’t. I think I do, though. I do believe you’re mine.”

Dan squirms a little at the heat blooming in his cheeks and in his chest and gives Phil a more serious kiss. They have a few minutes to let themselves be distracted.

+1.

Phil’s read the script. He knows it’s coming. Dan still hears his own voice replaying a certain few seconds of the edit.

“Companions through life,” video-Dan says. “Like actual soulmates.”

“—actual soulmates.”

“—through life. Like actual soulmates.”

“Stop being weird,” Dan whines, kicking Phil’s thigh under the table.

The video keeps playing for another minute or so before Phil pauses it and gives Dan his full attention.

“You knew I was going to say that. Don’t make it a thing.”

“I’ve finally corrupted you,” Phil replies. “You believe in it now.”

“You heard the next sentence, right? I even said, right there, that souls aren’t a thing. Soul_mates_ aren’t a thing.”

“You still called me yours.”

“It’s just a…”

“A what?”

“A word. I dunno, it’s just a fucking word, Phil, why are you making this a big deal? Stop acting so smug.”

“Why’d you put it in the video if you don’t believe in it?” Phil asks knowingly.

Dan sighs. “God knows why, but I love you, and you believe in it.”

Phil smiles at him and Dan stays quiet, letting the moment happen. He’s not sure what Phil expects from him right now; he feels uncomfortable and exposed—though he always does when he’s watching Phil watch his main channel videos—and he’s afraid that feeling is only going to get worse once he publishes this for the whole world to see.

Phil must sense his anxiety, because he reaches out and touches Dan’s forehead, smoothing away the tension between his eyebrows with his thumb.

“You know why I like it?” Phil asks.

Dan shakes his head minutely so as not to dislodge Phil’s hand from where it now rests in his hair.

“It’s the best word for what you are to me. You’re not just a boyfriend or a partner to me. I feel like every part of us is connected. Maybe it’s not fate, maybe it’s just luck and circumstance, but it feels important to me like nothing else does.”

“I feel that too,” Dan whispers.

“I know it doesn’t matter. That’s not why I keep harping on about it. I love you because of us, not because of some magical force giving us the answers. We figured it out together. It’s just a word, but to me it’s a word that means _you_.”

Dan finds himself nodding along and doesn’t even think before letting the words fall from his lips: “I’m yours.”

_fin_.


End file.
